Insights into the Effectiveness of Internal Audit

This book includes five related working papers that provide valuable contributions to the understanding of internal audit (IA) and its effectiveness. Paper 1 is a literature review that uses the perspective of new institutional theory as a framework. Paper 2 is an explorative work that studies the variables that are theoretically associated with the IA functions active role in corporate governance. Paper 3 is a conceptual essay that questions the status of IA as a profession. Paper 4 is an empirical survey that clarifies the discriminatory power of characteristics that may indicate IA effectiveness. Paper 5 is a qualitative research paper that breaks new ground in applying role theory (Kahn et al. 1964) in combination with the theory of relational coordination (Gittell 2006) to the research context of IA effectiveness. This work builds on an exhaustive literature review, provides a mix of different methods and perspectives and offers innovative and complementary insights that open the door for further research.